


rey is a skywalker and finn is a jedi and nothing hurts (aka the last jedi fix-it we all need)

by aworldofmyimagination



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Force-Sensitive Finn, Gen, Kylo Ren Redemption, Rey Skywalker, Rey and Finn share a room at the base, Rey and Kylo Ren still have a Force connection but it's not creepy, and pretend to be engaged when they go undercover, porgs take over the base and the Falcon and everyone just kind of accepts it, there's definitely going to be a storm trooper rebellion later on
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-04-14
Packaged: 2019-04-04 19:16:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14026968
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aworldofmyimagination/pseuds/aworldofmyimagination
Summary: Rewrite of The Last Jedi. Featuring Rey Skywalker, Force-sensitive Finn, Force ghosts, discussions about what balance actually means, and a plan to defeat the First Order that would actually work.





	1. Chapter 1

“Every heart has its secret sorrows, which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold, when he is only sad.”

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

 

Rey’s arm was beginning to ache from holding out the lightsaber. In hindsight, she wished she had chosen a better position than holding her arm straight out; it was becoming apparent that Luke Skywalker had transformed into a statue during his time on Ahch-To. He hadn’t even blinked, which was impressive, so of course Rey had tried not to blink either, but she’d given up pretty fast.

 

The awkward, one-sided staring contest was interrupted when something heavy and soggy landed on Rey’s head. She yelped, ignited the blade, and swung the lightsaber up, narrowly missing Luke. She was two seconds away from slicing at the creature on her head when Luke made a strangled sort of sound that might have meant stop. Rey took it that way, at least, and cautiously turned off the lightsaber.

 

As soon as it was off, the thing on her head jumped to the ground and turned to face her. A tiny bird-like creature was staring at her with massive eyes and an indignant expression. It must have come up from the ocean - or maybe just a puddle - because water was dripping off its ruffled feathers.

 

Rey was just about to make up her mind whether it was cute or terrifying when Luke nudged it with his foot and it flew away. 

 

“If sending me visions of her when she was a kid didn’t work, why would this?” Luke said to the air behind Rey. She looked where he had spoken, but only saw a faint shimmer - the sun reflecting off a puddle, probably.

 

Luke turned to the cliff and stared out at the ocean, glancing back every few moments to make sure Rey was still there. Rey couldn’t help but wonder how much time had passed - Chewie and Artoo were supposed to come up and find her as soon as they had finished securing the Falcon on the beach, but it had been a long time and there was no sign of them. Should she say something? Should she just stand here? Should she go find Chewie and ask him to strongarm Luke onto the Falcon and drag him back to medical at the Resistance?

 

Luke leaned down suddenly, picked up a rock the size of Rey’s fist, and chucked it over the side of the cliff. When he looked back at Rey again, she could see he was breathing raggedly. He threw another rock, looked back at her, then threw another. He let his cloak fall to the ground, releasing the clasps with frantic, scrambling fingers, like he would suffocate unless it was off right away - then he threw another rock. Rey took a slow step back. Chewie would know what to do, right? She tripped on a root right at the same time Luke accidently grabbed one of the screaming bird creatures instead of a rock.

 

Something about the screech or the sound of Rey hitting the ground must have brought Luke back to his senses. His ragged expression was replaced with a look of confusion.

 

“She...tripped? Losing your touch or something?” Luke asked the air again.

 

Rey glanced back again, but still only saw a shimmer.

 

“No, I don’t believe you now. What’s changed? You’ve gotten clumsy?”

 

Still, just the shimmer and an awkward pause before Luke spoke again.

 

“It doesn’t matter anymore. She’s lost, gone, de-she’s not here anymore. We looked for years until her Force signature disappeared. She’s-”

 

Rey spoke up. “I don’t know who you’re talking to or what you’re talking about, but it’s going to be okay, Master Skywalker. Chewbacca - you remember him, right? - he’s down on the ship right now with Artoo. We’re going to get you help. Mentally.”

 

Luke finally met Rey’s eyes. “I’m not crazy.”

 

“Whatever you say, Master Skywalker,” Rey said, side-eying Luke’s fallen cloak, where one of the bird creatures and several smaller, screechier versions of it had started to make a nest.

 

“Okay, one, leave the porgs alone, and two, I don’t even know why I’m talking to you since you’re just a hallucination.”

 

Luke waved his arm towards Rey as if to prove his point by having his hand go right through her. He frowned when his hand was stopped by her head. He tried again, then again, then sat down on the ground in front of Rey.

 

“I’ve been on this island for way too long,” Luke muttered to himself. “Maybe I am crazy.”

 

“Or maybe you’re just lonely,” Rey said, feeling a sudden rush of pity for the man. “I understand. It’ll be okay now, Master Skywalker.”

 

Luke looked up suddenly. “Or maybe I’m dead. Is that it? That makes the most sense.”

 

“What? No, no one’s dead,” Rey said. A flash of Han falling, a hole burned through his chest, crossed her mind and she clenched her fists, digging her short nails into her palms. “Not you or me, anyway. Your sister - General Organa, although I guess you already know her name - she sent Chewie, Artoo, and me to come find you and bring you back. She said ‘tell that hermit desert monk that it’s time to cut his oceanside tanning session short and come home to do some real work instead of moping around.’ Her words, not mine. She also said something about you turning into a lonely old man who looks twenty years older than he is and not to let the past repeat itself?”

 

Luke’s expression changed again. “Alright, I’ll bite. You’re probably a real person who just looks really, really similar to her.”

 

“To who?”

 

“I don’t want to talk about it. She became one with the Force a long time ago.”

 

“I didn’t mean to bring up bad memories,” Rey said. The crushed look on Luke’s face was too hard to watch, so she looked away. “Let’s just start over?”

 

Luke seemed more than willing to do that. He held out his hand for Rey to shake. “I’m Luke Skywalker. Welcome to my- what did Leia call it? Oceanside tanning session? It’s nice to meet you, I guess. So who are you, Miss-”

 

“Rey. Just...just Rey.”

 

“Rey, Ryla - they sound pretty similar, right? Come on, Luke,” someone said from behind Rey.

 

She whirled around. A blue person was standing right where the shimmer had been before. He had long hair and a scar across his eye and if Rey had to guess, she would say he was about Finn’s age. A porg flapped right through the blue man’s chest and landed inside his foot. The man made a face and took a step to the side.

 

“Who-who are you?” Rey asked. “What are you doing here?”

 

“You can see him?” Luke looked at Rey incredulously.

 

“Why is he  _ blue _ ?” Rey said in response.

 

The blue man grinned at her. “Anakin Skywalker, at your service.”

 

“Darth Vader?” Rey asked with wide eyes. She had heard some spacers talk about ghosts back on Jakku, but she didn’t think they were serious.

 

The man winced. “Er, not anymore. You can just call me Anakin. Or Ani. Or Gra-”

 

Luke spoke up. “Stop. Just...stop.”

 

“Maybe if you hadn’t cut yourself off from the Force you’d have felt it when the Force block dropped,” Vader - Anakin, Rey corrected herself - said.

 

“Force block?” Luke rolled his eyes. “You’re reaching. That’s not possible - not for that many years, not that strong of one.”

 

“Tell him, Rey. Tell him what it felt like.”

 

Rey wasn’t sure what was going on, but ever since she had fought with Kylo Ren on Starkiller Base, it felt like every molecule of her body was vibrating a hundred parsecs an hour. “It’s like something inside me has always been there, but now it’s awake. And I’m afraid. I don’t know what to do with it. And I need help. Your help.”

 

Luke shook his head and clambered to his feet slowly. Rey jumped to her feet to offer him a hand, but he just waved it off.

 

“You don’t need me,” he said once he was back on his feet.

 

“But I do,” Rey insisted, looking back and forth between Luke and Anakin. “You’re Luke Skywalker - I thought you were a myth, but here you are. There’s so much you can teach me, so much I need to learn. I  _ need _ to become a Jedi. And you’re the only one who knows how I can do that.”

 

Luke looked out over the ocean again. “I only know one thing - it’s time for the Jedi to end.” He started down a path towards another part of the island. Something about him told Rey she probably shouldn’t follow - yet. Just before Luke disappeared among the rocks, he called over his shoulder, “Tell Leia it was a good try, but I’m not coming back.”

 

“Your sister isn’t that much of a jerk!” Anakin called after Luke. Luke ignored him.

 

One of the porgs managed an impressive crash landing in Rey’s peripheral vision, drawing her attention just long enough for Luke to disappear completely. Rey kicked at the rocks on the ground for several moments before fixing her eyes on Anakin.

 

“You could teach me,” she said.

 

Anakin looked somewhere between amused and horrified. “Somehow, I don’t think that’s the best idea.”

 

“Why not?” Rey pressed. “You’re here, you understand how the Force works - better than I do, at least, and you’re dead, so it’s not like you’ve got much else going on.”

 

“Ouch,” Anakin said.

 

“Please?” Rey asked again. “I need to know how to control it. If Luke won’t teach me, then you’re the only hope I have.”

 

Anakin thought for a few moments, then spoke. “I wasn’t a very good Jedi, but I can still teach you this. The Force connects everyone and everything in the galaxy. Close your eyes, reach out. That humming under your skin - let it expand beyond you. As far as you can, and then farther. What do you feel?”

 

“I see the island,” Rey said. It was like she was a bird above the island, looking down at the rocks and the grass and the Falcon, where Chewie was attempting to untangle Artoo from a jumble of cables.

 

“But what do you feel?” Anakin asked again. “Forget about everything you know - how you know to see, hear, feel. Let the Force guide you.”

 

Rey squeezed her eyes shut tighter. Slowly, her birds-eye view of the island shifted. She wasn’t seeing through her eyes anymore - it was like she was present everywhere on the planet.  “I feel...life. Death. Decay...that feeds new life. Warmth. Coldness. Peace. Violence.”

 

“And between it all?”

 

Rey could feel the way everything - the porgs, the grass, the creatures under the water, the deteriorating skeletons of lives long gone buried in the dirt - fit together, like pieces of a puzzle that kept changing shape but was always complete. “Balance.”

 

“That’s what the Force is. Not just the light side or the dark - shades of gray. Balance,” Anakin said.

 

Rey felt something calling her, drawing her in with desperate ferocity and cries for help.

 

“There’s something there. Under the island,” Rey said. She couldn’t help but approach it, even as ice pumped through her veins and her skin felt like it was on fire.

 

“The dark side,” Anakin said heavily. “It’s been neglected on the island, forced back until it was contained in the cavern. The first Jedi were willing to study its power, but not to let it mingle with their light side temple. It’s been there for tens of thousands of years.”

 

Rey was still drawing closer. “It needs help. To be free.”

 

“Rey, don’t get too close,” Anakin said. “It’s too powerful for you.”

 

She could hear it whispering, making promises to tell her about her past - and to save her future. It could make sure Finn woke up, that he was okay, that the Resistance would win and the First Order would be wiped off the face of the universe until no one evil or cruel was left. It could-

 

“Rey,” Anakin said again, a frantic edge to his voice. “Rey, stop. Stop.”

 

A porg smacked into Rey, surprising her into opening her eyes. Suddenly, she was back in her own body, the humming contained under her skin again. Anakin was looking at her, concerned.

 

“Why did you do that?” Rey jumped to her feet and closed her eyes again, but nothing happened. “It could help, it could make sure Finn is okay, tell me about my family-”

 

“Destroy all your enemies? Give you the power to determine right and wrong in the galaxy?”

 

Rey looked away.

 

“The dark side is desperate,” Anakin said. “It will say whatever it needs to draw you in. But once it has you, it’ll walk the line between doing what you want so you don’t push it away again and working against you to make sure you don’t completely destroy balance.”

 

“But what’s the difference between the light side and the dark? It’s all the same Force, right?”

 

Anakin thought for a long time before he answered.

 

“The difference is that the dark side connects to the Force using emotions. Strong enough emotions can be used to, you know, force the Force to do what you want it to do. It’s not necessarily as inherently bad as it sounds, when used in moderation and correctly. It’s like guiding a herd of banthas. They’re perfectly willing to follow your lead to a point. They even like to follow your lead, since they trust you and want to make you happy. The Sith are extreme users of the dark side. It’s like they take the herd of banthas and force them to walk in a straight line right off the edge of a cliff and expect them to keep listening even after they’ve fallen to the bottom of the valley. 

 

“The light side connects to the Force through meditation and peace of mind. It’s like light side users ride on the back of a bantha and the bantha takes them where it wants to go. But light side users sometimes get too caught up in doing what the Force - the bantha - wants and let it walk right off the cliff, taking the light side user with it, without doing anything to stop it. The thing is, the Force can handle one light side user on the back of every single bantha, but gets confused when there are too many dark side users dragging the herd in different directions.”

 

“I think I understand,” Rey said slowly. “Banthas are like wild luggabeasts, right?”

 

“Let’s try this,” Anakin said. He grabbed a fairly flat log and a rock and made a sort of scale out of them. Rey wasn’t sure how being dead worked - so porgs could fly right through him, but if he wanted, he could grab rocks? - but decided not to think about it too hard.

 

Anakin gathered up a pile of feathers from an abandoned porg nest near them. There were so many feathers that Rey started to wonder how much of porgs were made up of body and how much was just pure feather. 

 

Anakin took a handful of feathers and put them on one side of the scale. 

 

“The light side,” he said. “Imagine every feather is a light-side user - the Jedi, a few communities built around old temples, the Guardians of the Whills.”

 

Rey watched as the side with feathers sunk slightly. 

 

“What do you see?” Anakin asked. 

 

“It's not balanced.”

 

Anakin grabbed two large rocks and put them on the other side of the scale. The side with the feathers was pushed high into the air while the side with the rocks clunked against the ground. 

 

“It's even worse now,” Rey said. 

 

“Imagine the rocks are the Sith. Traditionally, there have only been two true Sith - a master and an apprentice. Let's add a few smaller rocks in here for the other dark side users, like the Nightsisters or Dark Jedi or force-sensitive people working with the Sith. Now let's add on more feathers.”

 

Anakin kept piling and piling on feathers, but the side with the rocks stayed stubbornly on the ground. 

 

Rey watched him for a long time before she finally spoke. “That's not going to make any difference. The scale isn't big enough to fit all the feathers you'd need to balance it again.”

 

Anakin snapped and pointed at Rey. 

 

“There’s a prophecy about someone who will balance the Force. I don't trust much in prophecies, but many of the Jedi did. Their idea of balance in the Force meant destroying the Sith.”

 

Anakin moved the two biggest rocks off the scale. The scale shifted slightly, but the “dark” side still hovered close to the ground. 

 

“Other Jedi thought balance meant having no dark side users at all.”

 

Anakin moved the rest of the pebbles off the scale, so the “dark” side was empty and the “light” side, piled high with feathers, sunk until it floated just a bit over the ground. 

 

“That's not balanced either,” Rey said. “So balancing the Force is just a constant trial-and-error to figure out how many light and dark side users there need to be?”

 

“That's what everyone thought for a long time. But like you pointed out - I'm not busy since I'm dead, and I've had a lot of time to think about this.”

 

Anakin swept the feathers off the scale, leaving it empty. He waited until it stopped rocking, then grabbed several glowing pink and purple berries. He put the purple ones on one side and the pink ones on the other.

 

“The ahchberries represent Force users who draw on every part of the Force - they have more weight than the feathers but less than the rocks. There will always be Force users who use the light side or the dark side more often than the other, but it balances out in the end. Going back to the bantha example, they ride on the back of the bantha and guide it from there instead of controlling the entire herd from the ground.”

 

Anakin finished adding the last berry. The scale rocked back and forth a bit while it settled, but it was almost perfectly balanced.

 

Rey looked at the scale for a long time, then frowned. “I didn’t feel Master Skywalker - Luke, I mean - in the Force.”

 

“He cut himself off from the Force a long time ago.”

 

“Is that...safe?” Rey couldn’t help but ask.

 

“Probably not.”

 

“Then why do it? Is Master Skywalker alright? He doesn’t seem alright, but you would know.”

 

Rey expected Anakin to put up more of a fight, but he dived right in. “Luke hasn’t been alright in a long time. He lost his daughter - and by lost, I mean she was kidnapped during a trip with her uncle - nearly fifteen years ago. He looked for her for years, but her Force signature was suddenly snuffed out. Her uncle and cousin looked for a long time after that, but Luke knew she was gone. He threw himself into training a new generation of Jedi, including Ben Solo, when he wasn’t off looking for his cousin, but Luke was never the same. He didn’t notice Ben being corrupted to the Sith until it was too late. His school was burned to the ground, his students killed or sent home to their parents, and he came here, alone.”

 

“That’s so sad,” Rey said. She rubbed at her eyes. “What was her name?”

 

Anakin tilted his head. “Ryla Beru Skywalker. He called her his ray of sunshine.”

 

The pieces clicked together in Rey’s mind, but her heart wasn’t sure what to think.

 

“What-” Rey started, but couldn’t make a single word come out of her mouth after that. She sat down on the ground again and tried to think of something to say.

 

Anakin settled down on the ground next to her.

 

“The girl he lost was you, Rey.”

 

“I don’t understand,” she said. “That doesn’t...that doesn’t make sense. I don’t remember-”

 

“Search your feelings,” Anakin said gently. “You know it's true.”

 

Rey’s eyes welled up. She tried to keep the tears at bay, but it didn't take long for her to stop caring. 

 

“I waited on Jakku for so long. He said...he said he'd be back for me. That I needed to wait there and my family would come back for me - but if I left, they wouldn't have any way to find me and I would never see them again.”

 

“Who said that, Rey?”

 

“I don't remember his name - I don't remember anything before Jakku - but I knew him. He was family. But-but he was lying, wasn't he? He was trying to keep me there for some reason. I-I wasted so many years, I-I-I-”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The ideas about balance are a mix between the philosophy of the Je'daii Order from the Dawn of the Jedi comic series and my own ideas about balance. Really, it all boils down to yin and yang - Force-edition.


	2. Chapter 2

“Searching for the truth is easy. Accepting the truth is hard.”

-Star Wars: The Clone Wars, Season 2, Episode 15

 

Rey couldn't breathe. She scrambled to her feet and turned around and around. She finally stopped spinning long enough to start stumbling down the path back to Chewie and Artoo and the Falcon. 

 

She tripped twice on the way back and was struggling to take even shallow gasps by the time she ran into Chewie.

 

“Something-something’s wrong,” Rey gasped out. She still couldn't breathe, and her chest felt like it was on fire, and-and-

 

“Nhruagh,” Chewbacca said.

 

“I don’t know what, I-I-I think...my chest, it-”

 

Chewie picked Rey up and rushed her into the Falcon. Rey saw Artoo going off in the opposite direction but couldn’t focus enough to see what he was headed towards. Chewie ducked under several exposed, hanging wires on his way into the Falcon and set Rey down on the bed in the main cabin. Rey didn’t realize how much she was sweating until Chewie pushed the hair stuck to her forehead out of her eyes.

 

Chewie disappeared. Rey looked around for him desperately - was he going to leave her too? Just like her family and-and Luke, apparently, and she’d spend years waiting for him to come back and-

 

Chewbacca reappeared with a wet cloth. He pushed Rey back gently so she was resting on a pillow and put the cloth against her forehead - it was freezing cold and somehow made her feel less like she might pass out.

 

Chewie patted Rey’s arm and told her to close her eyes and breathe. Rey tried to follow his advice. As soon as she closed her eyes, she felt it again: the dark side of the Force huddled under the island. It felt like it was reaching out for every emotion, promising it could make it easier to breathe while stoking the fire in her chest. She could still barely breathe, but it almost started to feel like  _ power _ , like she was in control and was choosing not to breathe. Rey knew she should follow Anakin’s advice; he had warned her, and out of anyone, he knew what the dark side was like, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. She reached out and barely touched the dark side-

 

-and then someone was there, yanking her away from the dark reaching out and shielding her presence in the Force with their own. The feeling of being wrapped in the person’s Force presence felt like coming home. 

 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Rey said as soon as she opened her eyes. Luke was sitting next to Chewie, and Artoo rolled forward to bump into Rey’s leg. It took her a moment until she was breathing normally again and the pain in her chest disappeared. She was still sticky, though, and when she sat up the sheets stuck to her.

 

Luke didn’t seem to hear her - or to care that she had come so close to the dark side. He had tears in his eyes and was looking at Rey like she would disappear if he blinked.

 

“It  _ is _ you,” he said hoarsely. “How-”

 

“I don’t know,” Rey said.

 

Chewie’s chair made an awkward screeching sound as he pushed it back. He patted Rey’s head, then left to give them space. He hovered in the doorway for a moment, arguing with Artoo about leaving Luke and Rey alone, and finally came back in to grab Artoo and carry him out of the room.

 

They didn’t talk for a long time. Rey kept squeezing the cold cloth and did her best to keep from panicking again. Finally, she spoke.

 

“I waited,” Rey said in a voice barely above a whisper. “I waited for you for so long.”

 

“I know,” Luke said. His voice broke and he bowed his head. “I’m so sorry, Ryla.”

 

“Rey,” she corrected him.

 

Luke sniffed. “Rey. My little ray of sunshine.”

 

Rey wanted to ask why he had stopped looking, who had left her there, why he’d given up on the Force for so long - but Anakin had told her enough that she knew Luke wouldn't have the answers. Instead, she asked: “Why is it calling me? How do I get it to leave me alone?”

 

“Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny,” Luke said. It sounded like he was quoting someone, so Rey didn’t feel quite so bad about disagreeing with him.

 

“But I don’t like it. Or...I do, but I know I shouldn't. I mean, it makes me feel powerful but as soon as I look away I feel really, really weak. So I need to get away from it. Anakin said it's about balance - about everyone using both sides of the Force. But how can I do that when the dark draws me in like this?”

 

“Treat the dark side like a shadow,” Luke said. “Have it follow your lead but let the light guide your path. When everything is dark, you don’t have any control because you can’t see anything - but when light is there too, your shadow does what you want it to do. The Force is strong in my - our - family. My father has it. I have it. My sister has it. You have that power too, Ry-Rey. But it means the dark side is strong in us as well. This island isn’t the best place to learn balance - the first Jedi had the code right, but the dark side is too strong here.”

 

“The code?” Rey asked.

 

“Emotion, yet peace. Feel your...feelings, I suppose, but don’t let them cloud your judgement.”

 

“So if I can’t learn to use the Force here, then you’ll have to come back to the base with me. You can teach me there and help General Organa. I know you said she can handle herself, but...but something happened. I’m not supposed to tell you, Chewie is, but-”

 

“I know,” Luke said heavily. “As soon as I opened myself up to the Force again, I could feel it.”

 

“Then you know you have to do something,” Rey insisted. “You have to help us - to help me. Han said you felt responsible for what Kylo Ren did, but it’s not your fault.”

 

“It was,” Luke said. “I was so caught up in my own grief that I didn’t see that Ben was hurting just as much - maybe even more - than I was. He felt like it was his fault. It got to the point where he couldn’t connect to the light side anymore. Snoke used his pain to draw him away from his family and I didn’t even notice.”

 

“He felt like what was his fault?”

 

“Losing you,” Luke said. “He had been training on and off with me for several years, but he was still just a boy. When he was fourteen, Han took Ben and you to pick up an informant near the Unknown Regions - but a man named Gannis Ducain intercepted the Falcon. Han and Chewie tried to fight them off and left you both hidden in the ship, but Ben could tell they were losing the fight and went to help. He told you to stay hidden, and as far as we know, you did, but Ducain managed to take off in the Falcon with you still on board.

 

“We searched, but four years later, I felt your Force signature disappear. Ben was out searching the Unknown Regions when it happened. He came back a week later and three days after that, the Jedi school was destroyed and most of the students were killed or missing - but not Ben. We had been hearing rumors about a new First Order-aligned darksider named Kylo Ren during the year before the school burned down, but we didn’t realize that Kylo Ren was really Ben for another six years, when Ben burned down an entire Jedi temple he and I had spent months searching for. Snoke must have found him on one of his search trips into the Unknown Regions - or maybe Ben used searching for you as a front for meeting with Snoke. Han went back to smuggling, Chewie went with him, and I came here. Leia was the only one to do something about the First Order.”

 

Rey didn’t say anything for a few moments. She was struggling to reconcile the monster she’d fought on Starkiller Base with Luke’s nephew...her cousin.

 

“You’ll come back, won’t you?” Rey asked him again instead of thinking too hard about what he had told her. “General Organa needs you.  _ I _ need you. Kylo Ren - Ben - might have been your nephew once, but he’s a monster now and I don’t know how to stop him. Please, help me.”

 

“I don’t know if I can,” Luke said.

 

“People are dying while you’re sitting here. How many more people are going to have to wait for you - and for how long?” Rey couldn’t help but snap. She stood on shaky legs, ignoring Luke’s hesitant hand on her shoulder. “Chewie still needs to talk to you. Just...don’t follow me.”

 

Rey kept walking, out of the Falcon and towards the other side of the island. She looked back at one point, half-hoping Luke had come after her anyway, but he was nowhere to be seen.

 

Rey fell to her knees in the sand, the familiar grains digging into her knees. If Luke wouldn’t come back, what was she going to do? There was nothing for her on Jakku; all she had left was Finn and the Resistance. And if Finn never woke up, then-

 

Rey closed her eyes. The thrum of the dark side under the island called to her again. She knew what she had to do.

 

It wasn’t hard to find the place where the dark side had been contained. The sand turned gray, then black as she approached the pit in the ground. Rey slowed as she approached it. Was there a staircase leading down, or a rocky wall she could use to climb? She leaned over carefully, trying to see in through the roots surrounding the pit-

 

-but the sand slid out from under her feet and she fell in.

 

Rey fell and fell and fell for what felt like hours. She couldn’t feel anything but the gut-wrenching swoop in her stomach and couldn’t think about anything except how scared she was.

 

“Rey!” someone said. “Rey, you need to put aside your fear. Push it to the background and  _ listen _ .”

 

Rey closed her eyes. She tried to ignore the fear trembling through her veins - but she couldn’t.

 

“Don’t ignore it, Rey, just don’t let it control you.”

 

Rey closed her eyes again. _ Thanks for the warning _ , she told the fear in her gut.  _ I got the message and I need to think now _ .

 

Somehow, the all-enveloping fear retreated to a hum, reminding her that she needed to do something,  _ now _ , but letting her think. The bottom of the pit was still far off, but she was falling at an alarming rate and would hit the jagged rocks at the bottom if she didn’t get out of the way. She could see a pool of water between the rocks and a scattering of sand. Rey couldn’t swim and didn’t know how deep the water went, but anything was better than being torn apart by rocks. If she could just control her landing, somehow push herself to the side so she could land in the water, she would be okay. Rey reached out to the Force, asking it to let her land in the pool and letting the urgent humming under her skin  _ tell _ it to land her in the pool.

 

Rey wasn’t quite sure how the Force managed it, but she landed in the pool. She took in a lungful of water and struggled to reach the surface. The Force guided her to the sand, where she threw up a startling amount of water and stayed on her hands and knees, breathing heavily.

 

“It’s crazy, right? All that water in one place seems amazing at first but then it gets really scary really fast.”

 

Rey looked up. Anakin was sitting on a decaying log, legs crossed and looking at her with a concerned expression.

 

“I mean, you made a good start on finding the balance within yourself, even if you did almost die to do it. But my old master used to say near-death experiences seem to be the only way I learn - maybe it’s a family trait. If it is, sorry about that. Although Obi-Wan sure had his share of learning by nearly dying, and he’s basically my dad, so maybe he passed it on to me and it’s his fault we’re all like this.”

 

“He said he won’t come back,” Rey choked out. “Or, well, he said he’d think about it, but I know all about waiting and he didn’t seem like he wants to leave this planet anytime soon.”

 

“He’s scared,” Anakin said. “But he’ll come. He’ll always come when the people he loves need him, he’ll just whine about it a bit first. It’s a family trait. That Ben seemed to have gotten way too much of and you don’t have at all - you’re more like your grandmother in that aspect.”

 

Rey wanted to ask about her grandmother - had she been a Jedi as well? had he met her as Darth Vader? - but didn’t. With every minute she wasted, Finn was hanging on by a thread, the First Order came closer to discovering the Resistance base, the galaxy got farther and farther into another war. She had spent a lifetime waiting for her family, but that was before Han had been murdered and Finn had ended up in a coma. No matter what Luke was to her, she needed to stop Kylo Ren any way she could.

 

Rey could still feel the tendrils of the dark side escaping from the tunnel. It was pitch black - she couldn’t see more than a couple feet in - but she knew it would be okay. She wouldn’t misstep.

 

“Rey, I can’t follow you in there. The dark side will tempt you, but remember - you need to control it, don’t let it control you,” Anakin called after Rey. He might have said something after that, but if he did, the words were swallowed by the walls.


	3. Chapter 3

“You always knew what you had to do; no one ever told you. Nor were you afraid of the dark or what waited for you there.”

-Black Widow: The Name of the Rose

 

Anxiety pressed in from every angle as Rey walked farther and farther down the tunnel. She let it brush against her skin and didn’t push it away - but didn’t let it inside her either.

 

Rey had been walking for the better part of an hour when she finally stopped. “I’m not afraid of you. And honestly, you’d have a lot better luck with people liking you if you didn’t try to overpower them.”

 

The dark of the tunnel seemed to lighten a bit at that. Rey looked up and saw an opening in the ceiling where starlight shone through. Shadows still hovered against the walls, but the anxious feelings they were giving off retreated slightly.

 

“You have something to show me,” Rey said. “What is it?”

 

The darkness hovered for a moment, uncertain - and then Rey closed her eyes.

 

_ She was on the Millenium Falcon, huddled under the floor panels. She could hear shooting above her. Someone squeezed her hand and Rey swiveled her head around - a boy, who couldn’t have been older than fourteen, was sitting next to her. _

 

_ “Ben, what’s going on?” Rey heard herself whisper, even though she hadn’t meant to speak. _

 

_ “It’ll be okay, Ryla,” the boy, Ben, whispered back. “I’m going to help my dad.” _

 

_ Ben moved into a crouch. Rey made to follow him, but he pushed her back down. _

 

_ “Stay here. I’ll come back for you.” _

 

_ “Ben, no,” Rey heard herself say again. _

 

_ Ben pushed up on the panel. It slid out of place easily and he reached to drag himself up and out. Rey’s hand reached out and tugged on his ankle. _

 

_ “Come back,” she said, a panicked sort of feeling welling up in her chest. “Come back.” _

 

_ Ben shook Rey’s hand off his ankle and he hauled himself up. “I’ll come back, Ryla, I promise,” he said, then moved the floor panel back into place. She could see a bright blue blade ignite through the holes, then move down the corridor. _

 

_ Rey barely waited a minute before she stood to push it away again, but she couldn’t reach. She stood as tall as she could, but her fingers were always just barely brushing the metal. _

 

_ “NO,” Rey yelled at the top of her lungs. “NO, COME BACK. COME BA-” _

 

_ - _

 

_ And suddenly Rey was on her knees, cold metal grating digging into her knees so hard she had to grit her teeth. She wanted to look up, but a puddle of dread in her stomach told her she needed to keep her eyes down...or else. _

 

_ “Good, my young apprentice - but not yet good enough.” _

 

_ “But Supreme Lea-” Rey began, glancing up and meeting the piercing blue eyes of a pale, drawn-looking man. _

 

_ She was silenced by a loud bellowing sound and a burst of pain in every cell of her body. She fell forward on her hands and knees on the grating. _

 

_ “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Rey gasped out when the pain retreated. _

 

_ The man spat in front of Rey, the spit clinging to the grating for a moment before sliding down into whatever was below. “Three days this time.” _

 

_ “Supreme Leader, I-” _

 

_ “Four.” _

 

_ Rey wanted to protest again, but took her hands off the grating and sat back on folded legs. _

 

_ “Dismissed.” _

 

_ Rey stood, bowed, and left the room. She was halfway to Reconditioning when someone grabbed her arm and pulled her into a storage closet. _

 

_ “Three ration bars and a bottle of orange milk. Hallways Jenth through Nern are closed for floor refinishing so it won’t be subordinance if you’re a few minutes late.” _

 

_ Rey quickly started chewing. She smiled thankfully at the boy in front of her - somehow, he always seemed to know when she had gotten in trouble. He was a few years older than her, with kind eyes and dark skin and dressed in his stormtrooper cadet uniform. She had met him the year before, a few months after she had arrived. He had told her to call him Eight-Seven, which seemed like a weird name to her, but she had come to find that everyone had strange names on the base. _

 

_ “What did you do this time, Ryla?” Eight-Seven asked. _

 

_ Rey took a swig of milk. “I looked him in the eyes.” _

 

_ “Again?” _

 

_ “I can’t help it!” Rey cried out. Eight-Seven shushed her and shoved another ration bar in her hands. “It was an accident.” _

 

_ “You need to be more careful,” Eight-Seven said. “Slip told me Snoke might have found a new apprentice yesterday.” _

 

_ Rey was curious, but she had finished her last ration bar. If she waited much longer, she might have to spend even longer at Reconditioning. _

 

_ “Thank you,” Rey said, hugging Eight-Seven before slipping out of the supply closet. If she didn’t hurry, she’d be in for it- _

 

_ - _

 

_ -and she was wrapped in a scratchy blanket, sitting on a hard chair but quivering with excitement. _

 

_ “It’s pretty cool, right? It doesn’t look stupid?” Ben was asking, his voice distorted by the mask he was wearing. _

 

_ “You look like Darth Vader and kinda sound like him. Daddy said Grandpa needed the voice thing to breathe but you can still breathe, can’t you?” Rey asked. _

 

_ “Well, yes,” Ben said. “But it makes me look intimidating.” _

 

_ “Int-intim-what?” _

 

_ “Scary.” _

 

_ “You don’t need to look scary, silly,” Rey said. “You found me and so we’re going home now.” _

 

_ “We can’t go home, Ryla, I’m sorry,” Ben said and took off the mask. He looked older than when she had seen him on the Falcon and she could feel a hard edge to him that hadn’t been there before.  _

 

_ “But why not?” _

 

_ “It’s too dangerous,” Ben said. “The Supreme Leader told me...well, he told me he’d hurt you if I told anyone where you are. But he’s been teaching me for almost a year now. You and me, Ryla, we’re the true heirs to our grandfather's legacy - to Darth Vader’s legacy. Our parents never used their true potential. I’m powerful, Ryla, more powerful than him, than Lu-than anyone. Powerful enough that when the time is right, I can get rid of him.” _

 

_ “Won’t Daddy be looking for you? And Han and Leia and Chewie and Lando and-” _

 

_ “They think I’m out looking for you when I’m here,” Ben said. “Let’s just drop it. I’ll put your hair up the way your dad does it, come here.” _

 

_ Rey let him put her hair up, but she couldn’t resist pushing. “But you found me.” _

 

_ Ben yanked on her hair too hard and Rey winced. “And now I have to protect you.” _

 

_ “I don’t want you to protect me, I just want to go home,” Rey sniffed. _

 

_ “NO,” Ben slammed his free hand on the table. Rey tried to flinch away but Ben still had a grip on her hair. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to...you’re too young to understand, but I need to learn this power, I  _ need _ to-” _

 

_ - _

 

_ -and Rey was suspended in the middle of the throne room, the Force humming in her veins. Snoke’s pale face was practically white as he writhed in front of her, his skin shifting grotesquely. She could feel her connection to the Force dripping away, bit by bit, but Snoke refused to release his hold on her even as he melted before her eyes. _

 

_ Ben took a step forward. “Supreme Leader, perhaps-” _

 

_ “No,” Snoke rasped out. “Not yet.” _

 

_ Rey thought she might pass out or maybe die, but a sliver of the Force buried itself under her skin, dormant but waiting. _

 

_ Snoke finally, finally let her go. Rey collapsed to the floor. _

 

_ “It is done,” Snoke waved a hand at Rey. “Dispose of her.” _

 

_ Ben moved to kneel in front of Snoke. _

 

_ “Supreme Leader, I can take her somewhere, hide her away-” _

 

_ “Sentiment,” Snoke spat out. _

 

_ “A bargaining chip, if we ever need it,” Ben countered. “And a power reserve.” _

 

_ “Do with her what you will,” Snoke said, “but Skywalker must not know of her continued existence and she must not know her potential in the Force. The Force is strong within her. It will find its way back to her in time.” _

 

_ “Yes, Supreme Leader,” Ben said. _

 

_ “And after you do this, return to Skywalker. He will have felt her disappear from the Force and his spirit will be cracked. You will finish the job by destroying all he has tried to build - and then you will kill him, in time. With the threat of Skywalker removed, the First Order will rise and we will-” _

 

_ - _

 

_ -and Rey was spinning around and around in the co-pilot’s chair, the turbulence of landing only making the spinning more fun. A stern-faced man with black hair sat in the pilot’s seat. Rey wasn’t sure what his name was, but she knew she loved him a lot and had known him for a long time. _

 

_ “Who are you again?” she asked as the ship settled into the sand. _

 

_ “Family,” he said shortly. He grabbed Rey by the arm and led her down the ramp. The sand was so hot it burnt the bottom of Rey’s feet through her thin shoes. _

 

_ Rey frowned. “And who am I again?” _

 

_ He hesitated, then spoke. “Your father called you Rey. If anyone asks, that’s all you need to tell them. That you’re Rey and you’re from nowhere.” _

 

_ There was an outpost not far from the ship. The man led her there and approached a heavy man with pink skin and a large nose. Rey didn’t pay much attention as they talked, instead looking around at the strange outpost. _

 

_ “-make sure she doesn’t leave?” the man who brought her to the planet was saying. _

 

_ “I have my ways.” _

 

_ The black-haired man turned to Rey. “This man, Unkar Plutt, will give you a place to sleep, rations, and water. In return, you will help him with some simple chores when he needs them done. You need to stay here. If you leave, I won’t ever be able to find you again. No one in our family will be able to find you. No matter how long, you must never leave. Do you understand, Rey?” _

 

_ Rey wasn’t sure why there were tears in her eyes, but she nodded. _

 

_ The man nodded back at her, then turned on his heel and began to walk away. Rey waited until he was halfway back to the ship, then darted after him. _

 

_ “GIRL!” _

 

_ Rey ignored him and kept running, but she tripped and Unkar Plutt grabbed her by the arm as soon as she stood. The black-haired man had already reached his ship and was going up the ramp. _

 

_ “NO, COME BACK!” Rey screamed. Her voice caught in a sob and she struggled to get away from Unkar Plutt’s grip. “COME BACK, COME BACK.” _

 

_ The black-haired man paused on the ramp, but he didn’t look back. After a moment he continued into the ship. _

 

_ “COME BACK, NO, COME BACK!” Rey kept yelling until her voice was hoarse and Unkar Plutt’s hand was the only thing keeping her upright. “COME BACK!” _

 

_ “Quiet, girl,” Unkar Plutt shook her. _

 

_ The ship took off. It only took a moment for it to speed off into the distance, disappearing into the blinding sunlight. _

 

_ “COME BA-” _

 

_ - _

 

Rey sat up straight in the tunnel. The vision had given her answers, but also more questions than she'd ever had before. She made to stand - and then paused. Someone was in the tunnel with her.

 

Rey didn't waste a moment to wipe the tears from her cheeks - she jumped to her feet and ignited the lightsaber. Ben - Kylo Ren - was standing in one of the darkest shadows in the tunnel. 

 

“What are you doing here?” Rey spat out, but her voice trembled. 

 

Kylo Ren furrowed his brow. “I could ask you the same question. Unless...the Force has connected us somehow.”

 

“Well, get it to...unconnect,” Rey said. “You're a  _ monster _ . How could you kill your own father, kill all those students at the temple, abandon me on…”

 

Kylo Ren waited, but Rey didn't continue. 

 

“So you figured it out. You don't know how many times this last week I've regretted convincing the Supreme Leader to let you live. All that power, even with everything the Supreme Leader drained from you.”

 

“So why  _ did _ you leave me alive?”

 

“Sentiment. But whatever part of me once cared about your fate is gone.” Kylo Ren reached out his hand and concentrated. “You  _ will  _ bring Skywalker to me,” he said.

 

Rey felt the temptation to give in, to grab Luke and take off towards Kylo Ren in the Falcon, but she knew she shouldn’t. “ _ You _ will leave the First Order and feel remorse for what you did to your father,” Rey countered.

 

A strangled look came over Kylo Ren’s face. He started to take a step- then shook his head.

 

“That won’t work on me.” He spun around to face her with a steely expression, but Rey could feel that he was afraid. “It won’t be long, now. We will find where the Resistance is hiding and when we do, no one will be left to rebel against the rightful rule of the First Order.”

 

“You really have no clue where the base is, do you?” Rey said, satisfied. There was still time to convince Luke to train her, for Finn to heal and for the Resistance to plan a strike against the First Order. Something assured her that he had no clue where she was either - he could see her, but not anything around her. “Goodbye,  _ Ben _ .”

 

With that, Rey slammed down on her connection to him. She couldn’t cut the thread, but she could make it lead to only a distant part of her mind - a memory of her on Jakku, watching his ship fly away.


	4. Chapter 4

"A friend is one that knows you as you are, understands where you have been, accepts what you have become, and still gently allows you to grow."

-Unknown

Rey had meant to tell Chewie or Luke or Anakin or even Artoo about what she’d seen in the tunnel, she really had. But she followed it all the way to the end and it had led out right next to the Falcon. As soon as she had stepped on board, Chewie had taken off. They were in hyperspace before she found Luke locked in the cargo hold with several dozen porgs.

 

“I was going to come anyway,” Luke grumbled. “He didn’t need to-to abduct me. I didn’t even have a chance to bring along the ancient Jedi texts.”

 

Chewie roared that Luke must have memorized them by now, or else what had he been doing for so long?

 

“I never even read them!” Luke shouted back. “You’re depriving me of vital knowledge about-”

 

Chewie cut him off again.

 

“Okay, fine, you’re right,” Luke said, but he still leaned back and crossed his arms with a rather put-out expression. A porg landed on his head and he didn’t even bother to shoo it off. He caught Rey’s eye and looked like he wanted to say something, but he wasn’t sure what.

 

“I’m going to let them know we’re coming,” Rey said before Luke could make up his mind. “I’ll, um, be back in a bit.”

 

She retreated to the cockpit, but could hear Artoo tell Luke that he should really be thinking about what he was going to say to Leia.

 

Chewie gave Rey a knowing look when she sat in the co-pilot’s chair.

 

“I _do_ need to let them know,” she said, fiddling with the encoding settings. Chewie gave her another look and Rey relented. “And check on Finn. I haven’t heard any news since this morning.”

 

Dr. Kalonia, the doctor who had treated Finn, showed up on the holocomm with a knowing look far too similar to Chewbacca’s.

 

“How’s Finn?” Rey blurted out before she could stop herself, leaning in close to the holocomm.

 

Dr. Kalonia didn’t seem to mind Rey’s rushed question. “He’s just fine. He only needs to sleep it off now - we’ll pull him out of the bacta suit once he wakes up in a couple days. After a week or so more of bacta patches, it won’t even be sore.”

 

“Thank you so, so much,” Rey collapsed back into her chair. “Do you know when he might wake up? How bad will the scar be? Someone’s sitting with him so he’s not alone when he wakes up, right? Poe promised he would but I just want to make sure. Oh, and we’re on our way back. Master Skywalker is with us along with a bunch of birds from the island where he was staying.”

 

“Birds?” Dr. Kalonia furrowed her brow, then shook her head. “I’m not even going to ask. Commander Dameron commandeered the best chair in the medbay to sleep in just in case Finn wakes up early. I’m sure he’ll be glad to see another familiar face.”

 

One of the porgs landed on the holocomm and started to screech, cutting off the feed. Chewie knocked it off but it just hopped onto the console and made quieter screeching sounds.

 

Chewie looked like he was about to have a conniption, so Rey scooped up the still-screeching porg and headed back to where Luke was still sitting, arguing with Artoo.

 

“- _not_ going to have a joint funeral for Han and Ben, what’s wrong with-Rey! Artoo was just...um...” Luke scrambled for an explanation.

 

“I know what he’s like,” Rey said. “Unfortunately.”

 

Artoo made a despondent sound and Rey patted him.

 

“I’m only kidding, you’ve just got a spunky personality.”

 

That seemed to cheer Artoo up a lot. The porg Rey had taken from the cockpit landed on Artoo’s head and he rolled off towards the cargo bay.

 

“Were you really on Jakku the whole time?” Luke asked. “That was one of the first places we looked. How long were you with Ducain before you escaped? Or did he leave you there?”

 

A few hours ago, Rey would have said she wasn’t sure what had happened before Jakku, but now she knew the terrible truth. “I was on Jakku for 4,534 and a half days.”

 

“Half?”

 

“Well, once Finn showed up and everything started exploding, we stole the Falcon from Niima Outpost so we could get BB-8 back to the Resistance, since he had a map leading to you.”

 

“Wait, who had the Falcon? And who’s Finn?”

 

“Unkar Plutt, the junk boss at the outpost. He stole it from the Irving Boys, who stole it from Ducain - who put me in an escape pod and set me adrift not long after he stole the Falcon. And Finn is...my friend.”

 

Luke raised an eyebrow at Rey.

 

“Okay, he’s my best friend,” she admitted. “When Kylo Ren had me locked up on Starkiller Base a few days ago, Finn, Chewie, and Han came to rescue me. And after...after Han...well, when Finn and I fought Kylo Ren with your old lightsaber, Finn got really hurt. He’s going to be okay, though.”

 

“Finn fought with the lightsaber? Against Kylo Ren? And didn’t cut an ear off or anything?”

 

“Well, yeah,” Rey said. “It’s not that different than my staff and I imagine Finn trained with something similar at some point.”

 

Luke paused, frowning. “Where were you for the first three years? Before Jakku?”

 

Rey looked at her feet. Part of her wished she’d never gone into the tunnel, because she could have just told Luke she didn’t remember. She was saved from answering by the Falcon dropping out of hyperspace.

 

-

 

Rey raced down the ramp of the Falcon so fast on her way to the medbay that she ran right into someone wearing a strange, leaking, transparent and white outfit.

 

“Sorry, I’ve just got to find my frie-Finn?”

 

Finn looked like he had woken up barely five minutes ago and whatever his suit was made out of was spewing sticky liquid everywhere, but Rey didn’t care. She wrapped her arms around his neck, careful not to touch his back where the wound was still healing, and hugged him as tight as she could.

 

“I was so worried about you,” Rey said, not letting go, even though the liquid still spraying from his outfit was getting all over her clothes. “Dr. Kalonia said you would be alright, but you just looked so still lying there and you were so amazing fighting with the lightsaber-”

 

“ _I_ was amazing? Poe said...I think it was him I heard talking, at least. I don’t remember. Anyway, he said you whooped Kylo Ren so bad that one of the Resistance’s First Order contacts said he has a band-aid across half his face!”

 

Rey grinned into Finn’s shoulder. “Well, that was more the Force than me.”

 

“No way. Maybe it helped, but you were a beast with your staff already and the lightsaber is basically the same thing. You need a lightsaber with two ends, you’d be so good with that.”

 

Rey started to agree, then pulled back from the hug and stared at him. “Did you _just_ wake up? Dr. Kalonia said it would still be a day or so. Are you even supposed to be walking around? You could be hurt. We should go to the medbay right now and get you out of this leaky thing, at least.”

 

Rey realized she was dripping from the liquid too, but at least Finn’s outfit had slowed to a slow trickle instead of spurting everywhere.

 

“Wait, is that Luke Skywalker?” Finn asked Rey under his breath, staring at Luke, who was talking to Leia.

 

Rey shifted. “Let’s go to the medbay first and then I’ll explain everything.”

 

-

 

“Luke Skywalker is your _father_?” Finn practically shouted.

 

Dr. Kalonia hadn’t been very happy about Finn wandering off without being discharged, but she’d shown Rey how to put the bacta patches on his back, given him a week’s supply, and told him to come back once he had run out for a checkup. Rey had then dragged him over to the room Leia had given her to stay in - it had a bunk bed and an attached fresher that had cool, drinkable water every time she turned the faucet. Finn was on the bottom bunk, surrounded by every pillow in the room even though he’d told Rey he didn’t need them all, and Rey was spinning in the chair.

 

Rey shushed him. “It’s weird because I’ve been waiting for so long for my family, but I don’t know what to say to him. Especially since…”

 

“Since?”

 

Rey thought for a moment, then told Finn everything: about the call of the dark side, how she’d managed to push it behind her and let the light lead the way, about what she’d discovered in the tunnel - and about talking to Kylo Ren.

 

Near the end of her story, her voice broke and she got up to grab a wad of toilet paper to blow her nose. She waited in the bathroom for several moments, trying not to let herself start sniffling, but when Finn squeezed her hand on her way back to the chair, she sat down on the bed next to him and started to cry. When she finally pulled away from him, his shoulder was drenched with tears and snot. Rey dabbed his shirt with the toilet paper, but Finn waved her off.

 

“So you talked to the ghost of Darth Vader, who is actually Anakin Skywalker and your grandfather and has been dead for decades?” Finn asked.

 

“That’s what you’re most concerned about?” Rey blinked at him.

 

“Well, yeah. Everything else makes sense - they told us Snoke’s first apprentice had been executed, but that's probably what they told everyone about me - but _ghosts_? I don’t know how I feel about that.”

 

“You’re not more worried about _Kylo Ren_ being my cousin? Or my...my past?”

 

“A week ago I was a stormtrooper. I’m not exactly going to judge you for something that happened when you were, like, six and that you didn’t have any control over. And if the stories I’ve heard about Luke Skywalker are true, he won’t care either.”

 

Rey smiled at Finn, then jumped a foot in the air when something banged against the door and it slid open. BB-8 beeped excitedly and ran over Rey’s toes.

 

“I know, I’m sorry, BB-8,” Rey said, leaning down to pat the droid. “I meant to come find you, but then I saw Finn was awake. Not that I love you less than Finn, it’s just that he was hurt and...yeah.”

 

BB-8 seemed satisfied enough at Rey’s explanation. He turned to Finn and used his cables to swing himself up onto the bed.

 

“Droid, what are you doing?” Finn looked at BB-8 incredulously.

 

Rey moved to sit on Finn’s other side. BB-8 rolled over Finn’s legs, making him yelp, so the droid was wedged between Rey and Finn. It took Rey a few moments to pull the blanket out from under BB-8 and for her to get into a comfortable position, but she managed to get the blanket to cover all three of them.

 

“Really, Rey?” Finn said, but there was a smile to his voice. “I just slept for days.”

 

“You were unconscious for three days,” Rey corrected him. “And you’re supposed to be on bed rest for another week.

 

Finn started to protest, but a yawn caught him off guard. They tried to stay up talking, but before long, BB-8 had gone into sleep mode and Rey and Finn weren’t far behind.

 

-

 

“Strange, that would this would happen twice in such a short amount of time.”

 

Rey opened her eyes. Kylo Ren was standing across the room. He tilted his head.

 

“You’re back at the base, aren’t you?”

 

Rey felt her heart skip a beat and she nearly slammed down on the connection and jumped to warn Leia.

 

“Don’t be stupid,” Kylo Ren stopped her. “I don’t know where you are. I just recognize the sound of a rebellious base - I certainly spent enough time in them in my younger years.”

 

Rey frowned. As far as she could tell, he couldn't see anything around her, but he could hear what was going on? She made a note to never let her guard down anywhere that would give their location away. Rey was tempted to wake Finn up to see if he could tell that Kylo Ren was standing there, but hesitated - Kylo Ren had been the one to put Finn in the coma in the first place.

 

Someone knocked on the door.

 

“Rey, I know it's late, but do you mind if I come in?” Leia asked softly from the other side of the door.

 

Something like longing flashed across Kylo Ren’s face for just a moment before Rey shut down the connection. She untangled herself from the blanket, careful not to wake up Finn or BB-8, and slipped outside the door, where Leia was waiting.

 

“Sorry,” Rey said. “Um, Finn and BB-8 are asleep, so…”

 

“I know a place we can talk,” Leia said.

 

-

 

Leia’s room was maybe twice the size of Rey’s. It was painted a gorgeous shade of blue and several pieces of art hung on the wall.

 

“Alderaanian art,” Leia said. “From my home planet.”

 

“I’m sorry,” said Rey.

 

Leia nodded gently at Rey and motioned to a chair. “Luke and Chewie decided to spend the night on the Falcon. Something was said about Han not wanting anyone to mourn him while sober and a stash of Corellian brandy, but don’t tell them I overheard that. They’re going to pretend they aren’t hungover at the memorial in the morning and Force knows I’ll need something to make me smile.”

 

Rey’s heart clenched at the mention of Han. She waited a moment until the overwhelmingness dulled back to the normal sadness before she asked: “Did Luke tell you?”

 

“I had already guessed,” Leia admitted. “Not many people are as strong in the Force as you are. And you loved that hairstyle when you were younger. It took me a week to teach the boys how to do it properly. I thought Luke should be the one to tell you, though. My father used to say that I meddle too much.”

 

Rey furrowed her brow. “ _Darth Vader_ told you that?”

 

Leia shook her head. “Bail Organa. Anakin Skywalker is my father by birth, but Bail Organa is my father by heart. I was adopted when I was a baby. Although I’m sure Anakin would also agree that I’m a bit of a meddler.”

 

Rey shifted in her seat. “Kylo Ren...Ben...was the one who left me on Jakku. I haven’t told Master Skywalker. Luke. But I just...do you think anyone is beyond redemption? Even with...with what he did?”

 

“Luke has always been better at forgiveness than me,” Leia said after a moment. Rey could see her eyes were wet, but pretended not to notice. “But I can’t help but hold out hope that my son will still come back to the light. It’s foolish of me, most likely, but if Luke could reach Anakin after everything he did, maybe it’s not too late for Ben either.”


	5. Chapter 5

 

Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light. - J.K. Rowling

 

It was still dark when Rey and Finn joined the rest of the Resistance on one of the landing pads. Luke was standing near the back, on his own. At first, Rey wondered if they could sneak up to stand by Poe instead, so she didn’t have to worry about Luke asking her more questions, but he just looked so sad standing there that she ignored the knot in her stomach and led Finn towards him. Luke gave Rey and Finn a strained smile when he noticed them, but didn’t say anything.

 

Rey had never been to a memorial service before. She had found bodies in the ships she scavenged - although most of them had been little more than bones in tattered and charred flight suits after two decades of sandstorms - but she hadn’t really stopped to think about the people they had been. At first, she had been too young to understand and by the time she had realized that the bodies were once people, she was used to finding them and tried not to dwell on it. Looking at the ashen faces around her, she wondered if the pilots who had died on Jakku had been remembered in a service like this.

 

One by one, without saying a word, members of the Resistance set objects on a pyre made of green wood and boards from the boxes that rations were stored in. Finn nudged Rey and gave her a questioning look. Rey shrugged and glanced at Luke, who was squinting, slightly - whether because of the rising sun in their eyes or a pounding hangover, Rey didn’t know.

 

“We don’t have bodies,” Luke told Rey and Finn, his voice rough and quiet, “so this is how we remember them - with something that reminds us of the people we lost.”

 

Rey felt Finn shift beside her. When she looked at him, he was holding a squashed ration bar in his hands - a First Order ration bar.

 

“Slip gave this to me last week,” Finn said quietly. “After I went back for him during a training simulation of the village on Jakku. When it came to the real thing, though...he didn’t make it.”

 

Finn stared at the ration bar until the line for the pyre began to thin. Rey reached for his hand and tugged him gently forward. At the pyre, Finn hesitated, held the ration bar tight in his other hand for a moment, then set it down on the pyre, carefully, between an old Rebel Alliance poster printed on flimsi and a braided bracelet.

 

After everyone was finished going to the pyre, Leia picked up a torch, burning bright and orange, and looked out at the Resistance. Rey shivered as a breeze swept over the landing pad - Jakku had been cold at night, but she wasn’t used to the wind or the moisture in the air. Luke pulled off his cloak to wrap around her shoulders without saying a word. 

 

“Today we remember everyone we have lost in the fight for freedom in our galaxy,” Leia began. Her voice trembled, slightly, but was still strong. “As most of you know, I saw the destruction of my home planet, Alderaan, over thirty years ago, by the abomination known as the Death Star. The planet Alderaan, Jedha City, and an Imperial base on Scarif were all subject to the horrors of the first Death Star before it was itself destroyed by the Rebel fleet. The second was taken out of commission by the Rebel fleet before it could be used. I had hoped that our galaxy would never again experience the evils of such a weapon - but the entire Hosnian system was obliterated by Starkiller Base. Billions were killed, along with our galaxy’s government system and defense fleet. We lost brave pilots while destroying the weapon responsible for so much death. Many would have called such a feat impossible - but like Han used to say: ‘Never tell me the odds.’ There are only a few hundred of us compared to the First Order’s millions, but we evened the playing field by taking out the First Order’s biggest weapon. The pilots, politicians, and citizens of the galaxy who lost their lives in this fight will be remembered with grateful hearts by not only those who loved them, but by every being in the galaxy who remains free. Until the Force reunites us all, we will keep their memory close and we will keep resisting.”

 

The sunrise colored the sky pink and purple and orange above the mountains. Rey looked at it instead of at the pyre. After several minutes passed with no one moving, Luke moved forward to stand by Leia. She was still holding the torch but her eyes were squeezed shut and her hands were shaking. Chewie joined the pair and together, the three of them moved the torch to the pyre. It took a moment for it to ignite, but once it did, the whole thing went up in flames. 

 

The smoke from the green wood stung Rey’s eyes. She had ignored the voice in the back of her mind for as long as she could, but couldn’t stop it anymore. Han had offered her a spot on his crew, without even knowing who she was. He had been exactly what she had always imagined her dad must have been like. When he had asked her to stay on the Falcon with him and Chewie, she had imagined what it would be like if, somehow, he  _ had _ been her father. Han had treated her like family but had been killed before either of them knew they were actually related. 

 

Rey blinked back tears and tried to convince herself that she was crying from the smoke - although the lump in her throat made it hard to believe that. She looked over at Finn, who was wiping at his eyes as well. 

 

As the smoke began to thin, people began to head back to the base. Leia passed Rey and Finn on her way inside and paused.

 

“He knew,” Leia said to Rey. “Han told me about you, before he left for Starkiller Base. He said ‘Leia, I think it might be her. She wears her hair the way you taught Luke, Ben, and me to do it, she’s a natural with the Falcon, and she grew up on a sand planet, so she’s got to be a Skywalker. I’m going to bring them both home.’ I wasn’t sure if he actually knew what he was talking about until I met you.” Leia looked like she wanted to say more, but a massive crash echoed across the base. Leia winced and hurried away.

 

Rey heard someone’s breath hitch from behind her. She thought she and Finn had been standing in the back, but maybe someone had come late. She stopped herself before she could glance back - she would be mortified if someone looked back at her crying, even though everyone was sniffling.

 

She wasn’t sure how long it had been when people started to drift away from the landing pad. The sun was higher in the sky but was obscured by gray clouds and only Rey, Finn, and a few pilots were still standing in front of the embers.

 

Rey heard someone behind her again; this time, she turned, as inconspicuously as she could, and felt her blood run cold. Kylo Ren was standing there, maskless and wearing a black outfit that looked like he had slept in it. His eyes were bloodshot and his nose was red -  _ good _ , Rey thought spitefully, but then,  _ what right does he have to mourn someone he killed?  _

 

Rey grabbed Finn’s hand, who gave her a confused look, but he must have seen Kylo Ren out of the corner of his eye because he spun around. He let go of Rey’s hand when he turned and then looked around wildly.

 

“Rey, he’s gone,” Finn said quietly. “He’s-where did he go?”

 

Kylo Ren was still standing there, but when he heard Finn, he looked up. He met Rey’s eyes and his own eyes hardened. He looked like he was about to say something, but Rey heard an alarm go off on his end and he disappeared a moment later.

 

“He’s gone,” Rey told Finn, trying to keep her anger out of her voice. How long had Kylo Ren been standing there? How had Rey not noticed him? She was glad, she supposed, that he at least felt bad...but couldn't he have thought that through before he killed his own father? Some of the pilots still standing near the pyre glanced at them curiously, so Rey grabbed Finn and started walking farther away so they could talk in private. “You must have been able to see him because you were touching me - as soon as you let go, you couldn’t see him anymore and he couldn’t see you.”

 

“Should we tell someone about this? I mean, this is pretty freaking scary and I feel like neither of us has any clue what might be going on.”

 

Rey shook her head. “No. I mean, we probably should, but not yet. I don’t...I don’t want anyone to think I’m a...a liability and send me back.”

 

Finn stared at Rey like she had grown an extra head or two. “Rey, you’re Luke Skywalker’s daughter. General Organa’s niece. And Chewie’s on your side and he can rip anyone’s arms off in like two seconds. No one’s going to send you away. And even if they did, I would go with you and we’d figure it out together.”

 

Rey smiled at Finn, but the moment was ruined by dozens of porgs landing all around them. Rey wasn’t sure how they had gotten out of the Falcon but hoped Chewie had some ideas about how to entice them back in. At some point, they needed to drop them back off at Ahch-To and that would be impossible to do if they spread out around D’Qar.


End file.
